It was very cold. The snow was up to the horses’ bellies, so Silver Jack had to drive at a plunging walk. Occasionally one or the other of the two stood up and thrashed his arms about. At noon they ate sandwiches of cold fried bacon, which the frost rendered brittle as soon as it left the warmth of their inside pockets. Underfoot the runners of the cutter shrieked loudly. They saw the tracks of deer and wolves and partridge, and encountered a few jays, chickadees, and woodpeckers. Otherwise the forest seemed quite empty. By half-past two they had made nine miles, and the sun, in this high latitude, was swinging lower. Silver Jack spoke angrily to his struggling animals. The other had fallen into silence of numbness. They did not know that across the reaches of the forest a man was hurrying to intercept them, a man who hastened to cope with this new complication as readily as he would have coped with the emergency of a lack of flour or the sickness of horses. They drove confidently. Suddenly from nowhere a figure appeared in the trail before them. It stood, silent and impassive, with forward-drooping, heavy shoulders, watching the approaching cutter through inscrutable chipmunk eyes. When the strangers had approached to within a few feet of this man, the horses stopped of their own accord. “Hello, Darrell,” greeted Silver Jack, tugging at one of the stone jugs beneath the seat, “you’re just the man I wanted to see.” The figure made no reply. “Have a drink,” offered the big man, finally extricating the whiskey. “You can’t take that whiskey into camp,” said Darrell. “Oh, I guess so,” replied Silver Jack, easily, hoping for the peaceful solution. “There ain’t enough to get anybody full. Have a taster, Darrell; it’s pretty good stuff.” “I mean it,” repeated Darrell. “You got to go back.” He seized the horses’ bits and began to lead them in the reversing circle. “Hold on there!” cried Silver Jack. “You let them horses alone! You old little runt! Let them alone I say!” The robe was kicked aside, and Silver Jack prepared to descend. Richard Darrell twisted his feet out of his snow-shoe straps. “You can’t take that whiskey into camp,” he repeated simply. “Now look here, Darrell,” said the other in even tones, “don’t you make no mistake. I ain’t selling this whiskey; I’m _giving_ it away. The law can’t touch me. You ain’t any right to say where I’ll go, and I’m going where I please!” “You got to go back with that whiskey,” replied Darrell. Silver Jack threw aside his coat, and advanced. “You get out of my way, or I’ll kick you out, like I done at Bay City.”